Zoo trip

The Nashville Zoo is definitely different than what we were used to at Memphis, but Lilly loves it!!! The playground area is so much fun and huge. She loved being able to pet the goats that were just running around at the petting area. And the birds are great. The first time we went I made the mistake of feeding them the nectar and while I am holding Joy in one arm, about four birds landed on my other arm and I tried to stay as calm as possible...but inside I was freaking out. The carousel is one of our favorites and this time Joy even rode for the first time! What can be better than an afternoon with great weather looking at all the animals.


Josh took Lilly into the tunnel to see the Meerkats up close, they are so cute!

Easter Fun....

Many celebrations took place this Easter. It all began the week before Easter with the dying of the eggs. Lilly loved watching the eggs turn colors in the glasses of dye and she had even more fun decorating each egg with her favorite princess. We also saw the Easter Bunny three times - the mall, at school, and Gentry Farms. Joy liked the school bunny and even took a picture smiling with him, but not at the farm....we had to get a family shot.

Then there were the many egg hunts we had scheduled this year. About a month ago I feared my child would not be involved in one egg hunt, boy was I wrong. There was the hunt at school, in the neighborhood, at Gentry Farms with church, and Easter day with friends. So after we filled eight dozen eggs with candy and sent them off to the appropriate places we ended up having three hunts (the neighborhood hunt was cancelled due to the rain). But no worries because on Easter Day one of the neighbors had a hunt in their yard with some eggs from the cancelled hunt and to all of our surprise Lilly ended up with about 50 eggs filled with candy. It was a little much I will say. But Lilly had a blast and enjoyed every minute of finding all the eggs. The pink eggs were her favorite. She would even skip over the other colors just to get to a pink egg.


Then there was Easter morning. Both girls were happy to find their Easter baskets filled with fun goodies and even more surprised to see the tree out front decorated with candy filled eggs. Lilly wanted to eat every piece of candy and Joy just had fun shaking each egg wondering what was making that fun sound.



It is fun to celebrate holidays with the girls and do all the "fun" stuff, but we also reminded the girls about what an important time Easter is to remember that Jesus rose that day. This year we started a new tradition of making resurrection rolls. We talked about how when Jesus died they put embalming oil and spices over his body, then wrapped him up in cloth. So we used a marshmallow for Jesus dipped it in butter, rolled it cinnamon and sugar, and wrapped it up with a cresent roll and then placed it in the tomb (the oven.) When the rolls were complete we took them out of the tomb, opened them up and the marshmallow was gone - Jesus had risen!!! It was so much fun to celebrate this special day and focus on the true meaning of Easter.

Spring is here....

After a long, cold, dreary winter...Spring is finally here. Not quite sure why I haven't updated the blog in so long. I guess time just got away from me. Lots to catch up on so here goes...
Our house in Collierville finally sold in Feb. The church said they would help us with the payments for six months and it took exactly six months to sell. Funny how God works everything out in His time table.
Joy is now 9 months old. She is scooting around rather then crawling. She has learned to say a few words - ball, duck, bye bye, eye (as she points to a baby dolls eye), mama, and dada. She loves to eat. Just tonight she tried chicken nuggets and loved them. She also had pizza for the first time this weekend and kept screaming in her high chair till I gave her some more. She also had some avocados today and really seemed to like them as well. One of her favorite times of the day is taking a bath with Lilly.

Joy is also working on pulling up on everything she can. She was playing in her bed and loved pulling up and falling down over and over. Just look at this smile!!!

We have spent as much time as we could playing outside on the warm, sunny days we have had lately. Joy loves going outside. If the back door is open she is usually scooting over to the door and crying to go out and play. She loves to swing and explore.

Here are the girls wearing their green for St. Patrick's Day.



Lilly was so excited to get Princess and the Frog last week. We just love that movie. It was the first movie she saw in the theater when it came out back in December. She was also so surprised when she woke up this past Thursday to hear that we were having visitors from Collierville. Two dear friends came to visit and we just had the best time catching up and hanging out. As soon as Kara got to our house, they went to play and it was as if they had never been away from each other. They screamed, hugged, laughed and just had a ball for two whole days. Here are the two princesses...


The search has started for our new house here in Franklin. Pray that God will lead us to the spot where He wants us to live and call home for the next few years...hopefully for many years, boy am I tired of moving. This summer we will celebrate 9 years of being married and after we move out of the rent house it will be our 7th place to live during that time. Oh and for all you Rudy fans out there he is still as crazy as ever!


I am back on my blogging streak, so don't worry it will not be another three months before I post again.

Merry Christmas

Only two days left...thankfully all the shopping is finished, presents are wrapped, the groceries have been bought (some already cooked :) We are ready to celebrate! I love this time of year for so many reasons. The house feels all warm and cozy with all the decorations out, we get to hang out with friends and family all the time, Lilly is so excited this year...she can hardly wait, Christmas just brings out good feelings. However, today was a little different. My aunt passed away this morning and I was reminded how hard Christmas can be and will be for her family this year and years to come. It was a good reminder for me to stop and think about the things that really matter in life and make sure that is where my focus is this year. Taking the time to cherish every moments with the girls, Loving on Josh and being thankful that God has blessed us with such a good marriage, putting God first and making Him a priority in my day instead of just making sure I get to exercise in the morning (which is what I usually do). This Christmas instead of focusing on all the stuff we get and give to each other, I want to focus on the people more and build my memories around the conversations that take place.

I hope you have a rich Christmas this year and enjoy every minute of it! Here are a few shots of the girls:

Joy: all smiles by the tree. She is truly living up to her name. She is the happiest little thing. She did have a rather fussy day this past Saturday, but we quickly discovered her first tooth was coming in and now that it has come through she is back to her smiley self.

Lilly had a preschool Christmas program and Santa made a special appearance. Joy loved him this year to our surprise!

We had to take a trip to Opryland Hotel. It was beautiful of course. Here is Lilly posing by one of the many trees inside.

Update

Ok, I can't believe almost a whole month has gone by since I last updated. I don't feel like I have been that busy...but then again life can get crazy at times. So here is the latest since our fall fun pics.


We had all decided on Lilly being Sleeping Beauty for Halloween, she wears a pink dress which is Lilly's favorite so this all made sense. We had the dress and I bought the crown, wand, and some fun shoes to go with it. Lilly was so excited when it was finally time to dress up she loved her costume. So she wore it one Saturday to a Fall Festival at church. The next Thursday to preschool for their Halloween Party. Halloween morning to a friend's princess birthday party. When it came time for her to dress up to go Trick or Treating that night she had decided that she did not want to be Sleeping Beauty anymore. She thought about being Ariel, then finally decided on Cinderella. Josh took Lilly out around the neighborhood and she came home freezing cold, but very proud of her bucket full of candy. We bought two huge bags of candy from Costco and I thought for sure we would have lots of candy left over to munch on. However, our new neighborhood is huge...so we gave every bit of it away. Joy was our little pumpkin and I even found a pumpkin costume for Rudy.

All the little princesses dancing at the birthday party


Look at all that candy!

Have you ever seen such a happy pumpkin?


Cinderella and her glass slipper pumpkin


Joy is thinking...What is that orange thing on the dog, if only I can touch it...

After Halloween we had a baby dedication at church. This is Joy's second dedication, so she is going to be one blessed baby. She got another little Bible and we were given a prayer partner in the church to pray over our family. We were all given flowers. There was a yellow one to represent the little baby as precious as gold, a red one to represent the mother's blood bond with her child, and a white one to symbolize the father and the purity that would be prayed for in his raising this new baby. And the greenery was to symbolize the church all around our family praying over us and helping hold us all together. I loved looking at the flowers all week to remind me of this special day. We also enjoyed a yummy dinner after church with all the other babies and their families.



Joy is now five months old (soon to be six months next week) and is sitting up on her own. She has started eating rice cereal, oatmeal, sweet potatoes, and she is going to try squash tomorrow. She laughs several times a day and gives the biggest smile when daddy comes home from work. She caught her second cold this month (I think Lilly picked up something from preschool, then passed it on.) So we were home sick for a whole week. Joy is fascinated with Rudy and tries to reach out and touch his ears every chance she gets. She is grabbing anything and everything within her hands reach. Joy loves to suck her thumb and fingers. The new favorite way is her first two fingers turned around backward. Lilly is starting to play with Joy more and they love to scream back and forth at each other in a way that sounds like they are speaking their own language saying the most important things to each other. These are precious moments and I am trying to soak up every minute of them.


And I will finish up this long post with a picture that says it all.....
Yes...the house is fully decorated for Christmas. Two trees, stockings hung, peppermint placemats at the table, and a wreath on the door. I know it is early, but we are going to be out of town the next two weekends and I had to find something to do being home for a week taking care of the girls...and we just love Christmas!

Fun in the Fall...

Things have slowed down a bit and it seems like we are actually finding time to enjoy the beautiful fall weather. About a month after the move, everyone (except for me :) got sick, then Josh had a few out of town conferences, so me and the girls headed to Atlanta for about a week to visit Nana and Papa. Now we are all back home, everyone is well (I pray we stay that way for a while) and we are feeling much more settled in our new town. This week we took a trip out to Gentry Farms and we all had a blast.



Halloween is such an exciting time around our house. We have out all the fall decor, Lilly and Josh have loved taking walks and checking out all the decorations in the neighborhood - there is some really spooky stuff out there, and I love the smell of the spiced pumpkin candle. I also have to say I love our Saturdays of just hanging around the house and having football on all day. I am not the most avid football watcher (I was a cheerleader in H.S. and I still can't tell you what is going on in the field most of the time), but I was watching with Josh tonight the end of the AL/TN game and all I have to say is "Roll Tide!"
But back to fall and Halloween. We just took some time this weekend to enjoy the leaves changing, the cooler weather, and just hanging out with each other. I also took lots of pictures of Joy - she is just growing so fast....but this first one of Lilly and Rudy is great. They were just hanging out in the front yard and she loved holding his leash and dragging him all over the place




Tonight we had a fall festival at church and all the kids went in costume. Lilly is Sleeping Beauty this year - her favorite princess because she wears a pink dress. Look for the next post of Lilly in full costume....

New things....

I can't believe that a month has gone by since I last updated the blog. All of my time has gone to unpacking, finding my way around a new city, meeting new people, keeping up with Lilly, and taking care of Joy 24/7. Needless to say there have not been to many spare moments to sit in front of the computer. So here is the latest:

My favorite baby thing right now is the bumbo, just look how many different ways it can be used:


Yes this is our new backyard - This is definitely Lilly's favorite spot to hang out in our new house.



There have been lots of other new things going on as well:


Lilly's first day of preschool


Joy is now four months old


Yes Rudy is still around and as obnoxious as he was before (now he likes to find random things to bark at in the house)


We have managed to do a few fun things as well (these two I actually remembered to bring my camera for)

Play Day out at Monkey's Treehouse with friends (this was the neatest place to play with all sorts of different activities in this huge room, the girls had a blast!)


Family outing to Gentry Farms - Mr. Gentry cutting a pumpkin for Lilly. This is the perfect place to find pumpkins and there is so many fun things to do out on the farm.